The Mystery of M. Felix. Farjeon Benjamin Leopold
it? Here are people ready to say anything against you, while you are advised to sit in a corner without uttering a single word in your own defence. It's monstrous. Upon my word, my dear Mrs. Middlemore, it's nothing less than monstrous.'
"'So it is,' said Mrs. Middlemore, all of whose scruples seemed to have vanished. 'I'll answer anything you put to me.'
"I shall ask you nothing improper. You say that you locked the door before you went to bed last night. Which door? There are two, one leading to the first floor landing, one communicating between the bedroom and sitting-room. Which of these doors did you lock? Or did you lock both?'
"'I won't tell you a lie, sir. When I said I locked the door I thought you'd understand me. I mean that I fastened both of 'em. I couldn't lock 'em because the bedroom door key's been taken away, and the door on the landing's been cut into.'
"'That was done by the locksmith. Who took away the key of the bedroom?'
"'I don't know. Perhaps the police.'
"'Without your knowledge?'
"'I didn't know nothing of it.'
"'How badly they are behaving to you! Anyway, the two doors were closed?'
"'Yes, I saw to that myself. I ain't in the house without company, don't you think that. I wouldn't stop in it alone if you was to offer me Queen Victoria's golden crown. My niece is downstairs abed, and once she gets between the sheets she's that difficult to rouse that it's as much as a regiment of soldiers can do to wake 'er.' (This, our reporter thought, was comic, implying that Mrs. Middlemore had engaged the services of a regiment of soldiers to get her niece out of bed every morning.) 'Come up-stairs by myself in the dark,' continued Mrs. Middlemore, 'is more than I dare do. In the daylight I venture if I'm forced to, as I did a minute or two ago, because, though I shook Sophy till I almost shook 'er to pieces, and lifted 'er up in bed and let 'er fall back again, it had no more effect on 'er than water on a duck's back. All she did was to turn round, and bring 'er knees up to 'er chin, and keep 'old of the bedclothes as if she was a vice. She's that aggravating there's 'ardly any bearing with 'er. So as I couldn't get 'er out of bed, I come up 'ere without 'er. And that's 'ow I found out Mr. Felix was gone.'
"'You were speaking of what took place last night?' said our reporter. 'Your niece, Sophy, came up with you, I understand?'
"'Yes, she did, though she had 'old of me that tight I could 'ardly shake myself free.'
"'Did she come into this room with you?'
"'No, she didn't; she wouldn't put her foot inside it. I left her in the passage while I peeped in. She ain't got the courage of a mouse.'
"'Then she cannot corroborate your statement that the body of M. Felix was here before you went to bed?'
"'Ain't my word enough?'
"'For me it is, but it's different with the police and the public. It is a good job you've put yourself in our hands; there's no telling what trouble you might have got into if you hadn't.'
"'I'll do anything you want me to, sir,' said Mrs. Middlemore, in great distress. 'It's a providence you come up when I opened the street door.'
"'It is. You are positive the body was on the bed?'
"'If it was the last word I ever had to speak I'd swear to it.'
"'I believe you without swearing,' said our reporter, opening a cupboard door.
"'What are you looking in there for?' asked Mrs. Middlemore. 'Do you think a dead man 'd be able to get up and put 'isself on one of the shelves?'
"'No,' said our reporter, with a smile, 'but let us make sure the body is not in either of the rooms.'
"He looked thoroughly through the apartments, under the bed and the couches, and in every cupboard. Mrs. Middlemore followed his movements with her eyes almost starting out of her head.
"'Even up the chimneys,' he said genially, and he thrust the poker up, and then lit some paper in the stoves to see that the smoke ascended freely and that there was no obstruction.
"'The thoughts you put in one's 'ead,' remarked Mrs. Middlemore, in a terrified voice, is enough to congeal one's blood.'
"'My dear madam,' said our reporter, 'I am only doing what prudence dictates, so that there may be no possible chance of your getting into trouble. Suppose the body should be found in any other part of the house-'
"'But 'ow could it get there?' interrupted Mrs. Middlemore, excitedly.
"'That is more than either you or I can say, any more than we can say how it got out of this room; but out of it it has got, hasn't it?'
"'Nobody can't say nothing different,' assented Mrs. Middlemore.
"'This is altogether such a mysterious affair,' proceeded our reporter, 'that there's no telling what it will lead to. I don't remember a case like it ever occurring in London before. Where was I when you interrupted me? Oh, I was saying, suppose the body should be found in any other part of the house, what would the police say? Why, that for some reason or other-and you may be sure they would put it down to a bad reason-you had removed it for the purpose of concealing it.'
"'Me!' gasped Mrs. Middlemore. What would I do that for?'
"'You wouldn't do it at all, but that's the construction the police would put on it, and after that you wouldn't have a moment's peace. My dear madam, we'll not give them a chance to take away your character; not a stone shall be left unturned. There are rooms above these?'
"'Yes, a lot.'
"'We will have a look through them, and, indeed, through the whole house. It's what the police would do, with the idea that you were a party to some vile plot; it's what I will do, knowing you to be perfectly innocent.'
"He put his design into execution. Accompanied by Mrs. Middlemore, who always kept in the rear, he made a thorough examination of the entire house, from attic to basement, but, as he anticipated, discovered nothing. The last rooms he examined were at the bottom of the house, and it was there he made acquaintance with Mrs. Middlemore's niece Sophy.
"'Is that you, aunt?' the girl called out, from a room adjoining the kitchen.
"'Yes, it's me,' answered Mrs. Middlemore, irascibly. You're a nice lazy slut, you are, to be 'ulking in bed this time of the morning.'
"'I ain't abed, aunt,' said Sophy, making her appearance, 'I'm up; but oh, I'm so sleepy!'
"She came into the kitchen rubbing her eyes, and presenting a general appearance of untidiness which did not speak well for her social training. Her short hair was uncombed, her face unwashed, her frock open at the back, and she had no boots on. She stared hard at our reporter, but was not at all abashed at his presence.
"'I'm a friend of aunt's,' said our reporter. 'You had better finish dressing, light the fire, and give yourself a good wash, and then get breakfast ready. You needn't come upstairs till you're called.'
"He beckoned Mrs. Middlemore out of the room, and they proceeded upstairs to the apartments on the first floor.
"'It will be as well to say nothing before Sophy,' he said. 'Now, if you please, we will go on. It is plain that the body of M. Felix is not in the house; but it must be somewhere. The question is-Where, and how it got there? These rooms were fairly secure before you went to bed last night. Is there a chain on the street door?'
"'Yes.'
"'Did you put it up before you went down to your bedroom?'
"'I puts it up regularly every night.'
"'And you did so last night?'
"'Yes.'
"'And turned the key?'
"'Yes.'
"'Was the door locked and the chain up the first thing this morning?'
"'Yes-no!'
"'What do you mean by that?'
"'I mean I can't remember. I must be sure, mustn't I, sir?'
"'You must be sure, there must not be the possibility of a mistake; this putting up of the chain is one of the points upon